Sakura's Got A Gun
by Muffytaj
Summary: Sakura's got a gun, and it feels damn good.


**Sakura's Got a Gun**

When you have three years to plot the death of someone, you come up with a lot of whacky ideas. Fortunately, it was Naruto who came up with most of the stupid ideas, whilst Haruno Sakura concentrated on finding out how to heal people from as many different things as was possible. She figured that if you knew how to heal someone from something, then you would also know how to inflict the damage on them as well. In a twisted way, this made perfect sense: she knew that injuries certain areas where more difficult to heal, and so she would target them. She was learning how to kill people in reverse.

Of course, this resulted in a lot of research, but that was what Sakura did best. Put her in front of a tonne of dusty old scrolls, and she'll have them memorised by morning. Tsunade was delighted in Sakura's almost-photographic memory, and so set out to find the limits to it.

And this is where we join our young ninja, deep down underground where the oldest and most forbidden scrolls lie, gingerly unrolling one of the eldest scrolls in written history, and attempting to understand the faded kanji. It was very difficult, even the title made no sense:

"How to treat bullet wounds"

'What on earth was a bullet?' She wondered as she squinted at the tiny text. But she was soon to learn exactly what a bullet was, and the different kinds of objects that could 'shoot' the small bits of lead. The detailed diagrams of the different kinds of bullets and the different levels of damage they could inflict made Sakura open her eyes wide. Why, these 'guns' and their 'bullets' were untapped genius! Why had they been hidden away here, with no opportunity for anyone to use them?

As always happened sooner or later, Sakura's mind jumped to how this could be used against Orochimaru. Orochimaru could move fast, that was true. But he could move fast in relation to an object thrown by a human being. Could he out-run a speeding bullet? Sakura knew that he could not – he would not be expecting anything that fast, and since she was meant to be the 'healer', he would not be expecting such a powerful attack from her.

Sakura gave a start when she realised that she had already talked herself not only into creating this weapon, but personally using it. But then, why not? No one knew the best places to do damage better than her, and she was the perfect person to have a hidden weapon.

The weapon would have to be made secretly, of course. As the unmasking of Kabuto had shown, Orochimaru had spies everywhere. From the diagrams shown, it would be easy for someone of Sakura's great intellect to create the gun and bullet, and she would secretly train herself how to use it. No one ever bothered to come to her training areas, and they were isolated enough that she would sense anyone approaching long before they came into view.

It was easy for someone of Sakura's level to get the materials needed. The gun powder had required a bit of creativity on her part, but a few fireworks and a bit of soot soon did the trick.

She stood in the clearing, the gun cocked and ready (she hoped) for action.

"Okay…" She whispered (although there was no one around for hours) "Time to put this to the test." She was more nervous than she usually was trying something – perhaps because those were jutsus tried and true, and even her mutations of them were not so drastic as to put her in harm's way.

But this…this was a path long grown over, and the reason this technology had been abandoned was unknown to her. Reckless, she knew, but necessary for the success of her plan. Orochimaru would pay for her broken dreams. Perhaps she would make Sasuke pay as well, although Naruto seemed fired up enough to make Sasuke pay for both of them. Unbidden the image of Orochimaru's carcass and Sasuke helpless under the power of her weapon rose to her mind.

"Hell yeah!" Inner-Sakura screamed, fire burning in the background. "Make them pay! We'll MAKE Sasuke apologise for the way he treated us!"

Taking a deep breath, Sakura slowly raised the gun and aimed it at the target she always used.

"Three…two…one."

BANG!

Sakura screamed, and dropped the gun, massaging her wrists. "What the hell was that?" She gasped, staring at the metallic object at her feet. When she had pulled the trigger it had jumped in her hands as if alive, and she had had an impression of smoke and heat and loud noises. Perhaps she had messed up making the gunpowder? She sighed unhappily: this was going to be harder than she thought.

A bit of paper fluttered past her feet.

Sakura stared at it stupidly for a second, before blinking and looking at where her target used to be. Instead of a block of wood with a paper target attached to it, stood…well… perhaps she didn't need something as strong as this 'shotgun'. But she liked the look of the destroyed stump; she liked it because amidst the smell of smoke and trampled grass, she could smell victory.


End file.
